


Eye to Eye

by josephina_x



Series: Dimension 46'\-E [3]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Crossover, Gen, Post-Series, Post-Weirdmageddon, Zero Gravity AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2017-12-20
Packaged: 2019-02-17 10:20:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13074837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/josephina_x/pseuds/josephina_x
Summary: Ford and Bill bond a bit over terrorizing cultists.





	Eye to Eye

**Author's Note:**

> Fic: Eye to Eye  
> Fandom: Gravity Falls  
> Pairing: n/a  
> Rating: PG-13  
> Spoilers: through the end of the series, and some of the books (Journal #3)  
> Summary: Ford and Bill bond a bit over terrorizing cultists.  
> Disclaimer: Not mine, not for profit.  
> AN: More Zero Gravity AU meets Gravity Falls madness.
> 
> Information on tanosan96’s Zero Gravity AU can be found [here](http://tanosan96.tumblr.com/post/147541258187/zero-gravity-au-full-characters-design-and-plot) and [here](http://tanosan96.tumblr.com/post/149841490722/zero-gravity-au-official-story-contents)! (I had to take a little bit of liberty with the ‘official’ AU town name for plot reasons, but hopefully no one will take offense ^_^;;)

\---

“Hello?” Ford called out into the woods, sotto voce, as he neared the empty clearing that had once held Bill Cipher’s body in petrified form. He could have sworn that he’d heard sobbing for a moment there, but…

“ _Help!_ ” came an unfamiliar voice.

“Aw, quit yer whining, you dumb jerk!” came another that sounded younger, and newly-familiar.

Ford grimaced, and crept around the edges of the clearing, through the underbrush.

He heard the impact of flesh on flesh, and a whimper.

“Bill…”

“What? These jerks kidnapped us, they gotta know something!” A slapping sound. “And they will, if they know what’s good for ‘em.”

“You-- you-- please--”

“Unless they _don’t_.” Ford peered through a bush, to see the back of the blond-haired ‘Bill’ leaning forward and… terrorizing a cultist who’d been tied to a tree with his own hooded robe? “In which case… we’ll just leave ‘em out here for the bears!” And then Bill laughed in a very Bill Cipher way.

It made Ford wince and wonder exactly how much exposure these two had had to the insane triangle, as well as the when and why of it. It must have happened at some point.

“Billll…” Ford heard Will say. “That’s _mean_. We can’t do that.”

Peering out a little farther, he spotted ‘Will’ at Bill’s side, his posture a great deal less self-assured than that of his twin brother. He was clutching a new stick -- one that looked more like a club -- to his chest while almost clinging to his brother’s right arm, tentatively, by his fingertips.

“Huh? --Oh, yeah yeah, I hear ya,” said Bill, good-naturedly. “Don’t wanna give the bears indigestion.”

The cultist whimpered again.

“Bill…”

...Actually, no, make that _two_ cultists who were tied to the same tree, next to each other. Ford only spotted the one by shifting sideways a bit; the blue-haired teenager had been blocking his view.

He must’ve made a little too much noise when he did that, though, because the teenager named Bill whirled in place. “Who’s there!?” He grabbed the stick out of his brother’s hand and brandished it in Ford’s general direction, glancing around and obviously trying to spot him.

“Ah, that would be me,” Ford said carefully, as raised his hands and slowly stood up from where he’d been crouching.

He felt a little better about exposing himself in this way, now that he had his gun back from Stanley. Though what on earth had possessed his brother to stash it in the cooler…

He saw both Bill and Will frown, Bill brandishing his new stick more accurately, and Will hiding a bit behind his brother’s back.

“I’m sorry about earlier,” Ford said, keeping his hands up and not making any attempt to move forward just yet. “It was a case of mistaken identity. I thought your brother was rather someone else, entirely.”

Bill was still looking on with no small suspicion, and Will wasn’t looking any less afraid.

“Ah, do you mind if I help with your interrogation?” Ford half-asked, half-offered. “I tried to chase after a few of the cultists myself earlier, but I was unsuccessful in capturing any of them.”

Bill tilted his head at him, then dropped the stick back against his shoulder in a resting position.

“You know these yahoos?” Bill asked him.

“Well,” Ford lowered his hands and adjusted his glasses. “Not personally.”

Bill smirked.

“How bad do you want ‘em?” he asked Ford, and Ford blinked at him.

“What?” Ford asked, nonplussed.

“We were only trying to summon him!” wailed the cultist on the right, and Ford had to stifle a sigh, because that was not likely to go over well. Magic wasn’t exactly a staple for city kids these days, and these two certainly looked the part -- no, rather, magic was something that most people in this dimension did not consider to be remotely possible, nor was it generally considered practically useful in those few dimensions where magic _was_ widely known to exist, oddly enough.

But Ford was surprised to find that, opposite to expectation, the cultist’s wail seemed to have captured Bill’s attention immediately, from the way his head whipped back around.

“--Summon _who?!_ ” Bill demanded immediately.

Ford opened his mouth to interject with a question.

“Bill Cipher!”

...and closed it again at the dumbfounded look on both of the teenagers’ faces as they froze in place.

“Bill…” his brother tugged at his sleeve.

Bill got a slight frown.

“Bill… you can’t summon _people_ with magic,” Will said, with wavering uncertainty in his tone, “...can you?”

Bill tilted his head slightly, staring at the cultist.

And then he started to grin.

Ford slowly, and carefully, moved forward and out of the bushes.

“Heh,” said Bill.

“Bill, _no_ ,” Will said, sounding aghast. “You can’t!”

“It’d be _useful_ ,” Bill said, his tone holding a great deal of suppressed laughter and glee. “I bet I could make a _ton_ of money off’a--”

“But--!” Will tugged at his sleeve. “Y-you promised that you wouldn’t--”

“--It won’t be outta the _book_ ,” Bill said in what Ford assumed were supposed to be reassuring tones, shifting in place into a more stable wide-set posture and twirling the stick one-handed. “I’ll be beating it out of _them!_ ” he said, in the same kind of tone Ford was used to hearing out of Stanley when he was taking advantage of a loophole of some sort that he’d found.

Ford slowly walked up to stand at Bill’s left, opposite of Bill’s brother, though he made certain to stand far enough away that he was not within weapon range of Bill, and Bill was not within arm’s reach of him.

“Book?” Ford asked carefully. “What book?”

Bill and Will’s attention immediately snapped over to him.

Bill’s eyes narrowed, while Will clammed up immediately and turned pink, looking embarrassed or caught-out somehow.

“Nothing,” said Bill, while fingering his stick-club. “Forget it.”

Ford hesitated for a moment, then said, “If you’re looking to expand your spell repertoire,” he started, and Bill seemed to be listening but cautiously, “I wouldn’t mind trading--”

“--No,” Bill said immediately and flatly, going still.

‘ _Interesting,_ ’ Ford thought. ‘ _He has a book of spells that… he promised someone that he wouldn’t share anything out of?_ ’

“All right,” Ford said casually. “Though if you change your mind--”

“I won’t,” Bill said with finality, eyeing him like he was a threat.

“All right,” Ford said, in agreement. “I understand.”

Bill eyed him. “Do you.”

Ford nodded. “Some spells are too dangerous to share,” Ford told him easily, thinking he was giving the boy an out.

...except Bill’s eyes lit up with interest, though he bit his lip and didn’t say anything.

‘ _...Well, that’s a little worrying,_ ’ thought Ford.

“...Help?” the first cultist asked again -- of him, apparently, because when the three of them turned to look at the man, he seemed to be looking at Ford.

Ford eyed him.

Then he smiled.

“I suggest that you tell us everything that you know,” Ford said.

The man looked slightly belligerent.

Ford lifted his trenchcoat away from his gun.

The man’s eyes widened and he went pale. He looked up at Ford.

Ford let his smile get a little wider, showing teeth.

The first cultist didn’t talk -- he fainted when Ford shot a rather large hole through the tree next to his head -- but the second one sure did.

\---

Ford found himself at ease, walking through the woods shoulder-to-shoulder with the two teenagers, after having helped finish interrogating the remaining conscious cultist.

They were headed in the direction of the Shack when Bill said, “I wanna check something,” steering them back towards the clearing.

“Where were you two when the cultists grabbed you?” Ford asked of Will, as Bill increased his walking speed and moved slightly ahead of them.

“Last thing either of us remember is being at a bus stop, on the way to Seattle,” Bill called back over his shoulder. “I was taking my bro here to a music audition. He sings,” Bill explained succinctly.

“Ah,” said Ford. “Well, that would explain the attire.”

Will smiled up at him tentatively.

Ford found himself slowing down to match the boy’s speed, and he realized in short order that the teenager had a bit of a limp.

“Are you alright?” he asked. “You seem to be walking--” He stopped when Will blushed and looked away from him.

“I-I’m not really…” Will began. He looked worse than embarrassed, Ford realized. “My legs aren’t really… the same height,” he said, “and…”

Ford looked him over a little more carefully. “Ah, yes. Severe scoliosis and limb length discrepancy,” he noted clinically. “It doesn’t cause you any pain, I hope?”

Will stared up at him with a mix of emotion Ford couldn’t quite parse. He was a bit wide-eyed, though.

“No, I--” Will took in a breath. “I’m fine as long as I don’t try and walk too fast.” He ducked his head and curved his shoulders inwards slightly. “Bill usually carries me piggy-back when we have to move fast.”

Ford felt his eyebrows go up.

It was about that point that he realized that he’d lost track of Bill.

“Where _is_ your brother?” Ford asked, looking ahead and not seeing him.

Will glanced away, and shoved his hands in his pockets.

Ford blinked, then realized that Will had slowed down his walking speed on purpose.

Ford glanced up, frowned back at Will, and picked up his walking speed a good clip.

He didn’t leave Will behind in the dust, or even let him get out of view, but he did feel a bit annoyed at having been played, though in what manner exactly was yet to be determined.

He broke into the clearing to see Bill finishing up with scratching out the last of the symbols around the circle’s periphery in the dirt with the end of his stick.

When Bill heard him, he looked up with a belligerent expression.

“It’s not something you need to know about,” Bill said. “It’s got nothing to do with you.”

Ford blinked, because the teenager looked and sounded almost protective somehow.

“Well, you’re going about it the wrong way, then,” Ford told him.

“What?” Bill said, as Will entered the clearing.

Ford smiled at him a bit wearily. “I looked at it earlier,” he told Bill. “And I’ve seen something like this before. The only new symbol to me is the one in the center of the circle,” he told him, pointing to where Bill Cipher’s image was supposed to be. And it was the only one that Bill hadn’t scratched out, oddly enough.

“Symbols,” he heard Will say, and Ford glanced over his shoulder at him in surprise.

He looked down at the center-symbol, with the diagonal from top-right to bottom-left straight through it, and realized that Will was correct -- at second-glance, it was actually two symbols, discontinued, not one. It looked like the upper left portion was an open eye just like Bill Cipher’s, and the lower right was a representation of a partly-closed eye in the same mode.

Then he blinked as he looked up again, and finally caught a good look at the symbol on the front of Bill’s yellow hoodie -- a triangle with a Cipher-eye on it, fully-open.

“You--” Ford stared, speechless.

Bill looked uncomfortable suddenly.

“Will’s got a sweater with the other eye-thing on it,” Bill muttered, looking vaguely embarrassed, swinging the stick back and forth at his side. But then he looked Ford straight in the eye, belligerently. “And I don’t believe you about the--”

“Pine Tree, Shooting Star, Glasses, Six-fingered Hand,” Ford listed off in rapid succession, watching Bill stare at him and pale. “Do I need to go on?”

Bill shook his head once, not looking away from him.

“Your last name,” Ford began slowly, glancing between them, “isn’t actually...”

“Cipher?” Bill seemed to light up a bit. “Well, sure it is!” he laughed out, grinning.

“Billll…” his brother complained.

“Because I’m soooo--” Bill said, getting into it, raising his hands to wiggle his fingers at him around the thick branch with a sly look on his face.

“Biiiiiiiiill!” Will complained more loudly.

“Fine, fine,” Bill said, clutching the stick more tightly again and swinging it up to grip it two-handed on either side of his head, resting against the back of his neck. “If you don’t like it so much, then _you_ come up with a better one.”

Ford frowned at them both. ‘Cipher’ was… a stage name? Wasn’t this the sort of thing a family usually decided together -- or the parents, rather than the children?

And then he finally realized what had been bugging him about them both.

“How old are the two of you?” Ford asked, as a precursor. He’d originally thought Will to be around 17 or so, given his height, but with the way the two of them acted...

“Fifteen,” said Will, who then winced slightly at the suppressive look that his brother Bill shot him.

Well, that was one worry Ford was glad to not have to deal with. Ford doubted either of them would have offered up their true younger age if they’d run away from home. But then a very different worry followed on the heels of the first.

“Were your parents on the bus with you when--” Ford began urgently.

“--No,” Bill said cutting him off.

Ford stopped, giving a small mental sigh of relief. Frantic parents were the last thing he was well-equipped to deal with. Potentially hostile and lethal cryptids, yes; frightened and panicking parents, no.

“If you need to call your parents--” he began, thinking to offer them use of the telephone at the Shack. He wasn’t certain how far away they’d started from the city of Seattle, or when they were next meant to check in with their folks, but this sleepy town in Oregon was almost certainly well out of the way of the path their trip was meant to take.

“--It’s fine,” Bill said, cutting him off.

Ford frowned, slightly taken aback. “You’re not anywhere near the city of Seattle at the moment,” he told them, now worrying slightly at what their reaction might be to finding exactly _how_ far out of the way they were.

“Yeah?”

Ford began to feel uneasy at how well both brothers seemed to be taking this pronouncement.

“You’re not even in the state of Washington. You’re in the state of Oregon,” he told them, as Will moved across the clearing to stand at his brother’s side again.

At this pronouncement, he saw the twins both relax and exchange glances with each other.

“Guess we won’t have to worry about having enough money on us to get back, then,” Bill said, as Will looked a little relieved.

Ford frowned slightly. “Where are you two from?”

They both looked at him without responding. Ford looked at the two of them, confused, until Bill shifted in place and finally said, “Don’t see what that has to do with anything.”

Ford sighed and rephrased the question. “Where do you need to get back to?”

Bill looked a little amused. “You wouldn’t’ve heard of it.” Bill glanced over at his brother, like he was sharing a joke. “We only stumbled across it by accident.”

“Try me,” Ford said. He’d made it a habit to memorize any maps he could get his hands on for some time now, in this dimension or any other.

Bill exchanged another look with his brother. “Well, okay,” said Bill. “See, there’s this weird little town out in the middle of nowhere called Gravity Falls--”

Ford wasn’t sure what the look on his face was, that had Bill stopping and blinking at him in confusion, but he knew that he felt like the ground had been pulled out from under him.

‘ _Oh, no…_ ’ Ford thought.

“What?” Bill said with a frown.

“You’re in Gravity Falls right now,” Ford heard himself say, through the shock.

He wasn’t surprised when Bill looked at him in utter disbelief. “What?”

“You’re in--”

“-- _You’re_ not from town,” Bill cut in, almost glaring at him. “I don’t remember seeing you, or that other guy, around. --Or that touristy place.”

“Bill--” Ford began.

“It’s a small town,” Bill said.

“-- _I know_ ,” Ford said urgently. “You’re in Gravity Falls, just not _your_ Gravity Falls,” he got out quickly.

The twins both stared at him.

“...There’s more than one Gravity Falls?” Will said tentatively, sounding confused.

“There are an infinite number of dimensions, several of which have a Gravity Falls, Oregon in them, yes,” Ford told them, hoping beyond hope that this revelation wouldn’t be quite so jarring as he feared, but unwilling to be less than honest with them about it. “Technically, an infinite number of dimensions have a Gravity Falls, just a smaller infinity than, well…”

He watched them, waiting for the panic when they realized exactly how far away from home and family that they were, with no small dread.

Bill lowered the stick from the back of his neck, letting it point towards the ground.

“Infinite dimensions,” he repeated.

“Yes,” said Ford. “I’m afraid that this summoning circle must have been… rather badly done,” he said. “I’ve never heard of anyone being able to use one to pull _human beings_ across dimensional barriers before, though,” he admitted with no small amount of frustration and consternation, glancing down at it. “It shouldn’t be possible.”

“We’re in another dimension,” said Bill, as his brother looked over at him.

“...I believe so, yes,” Ford said. “It would explain a great deal.”

Bill frowned at him a bit.

“How do you know about infinite dimensions and summoning circles and things?” Will asked him.

“Ah, well,” Ford said, feeling a little embarrassed. “I was an interdimensional traveller for almost thirty years--”

“--Wait,” Bill cut in suddenly. “ _You’ve_ been to other dimensions?”

“Yes,” Ford said.

“For thirty years,” Bill said.

“Yes,” Ford said, bracing himself for the inevitable scoffing and disbelief.

What he got instead was a Bill ‘Cipher’ who was getting a slow-growing, almost manic grin.

“You’re an interdimensional traveler who’s been visiting different dimensions for thirty years,” Bill said.

“Ah… yes,” Ford said, wondering if perhaps he should be bracing himself for mocking laughter instead.

Bill’s grin got wider, and his eyes lit up.

“So you’ve talked to _aliens?_ ” Bill said. “Been on other planets? --Travelled in _spaceships?_ ” his voice was getting higher, his talking speed more rapid, and his grin even wider and wider.

“Ah, yes to all of the above,” Ford admitted, feeling a bit surprised at this response.

Apparently, this confirmation was enough to open the floodgates to a litany of excited questions about Ford’s multidimensional travels.

Oddly, Ford couldn’t help but feel a small growing bit of warmth in his chest at Bill’s marked and obvious interest in his travels.

\---


End file.
